Page 104 - Conflitti Militari e Popolazioni Civili - Tomo II

606 XXXIV Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

british bLockade
On April 8 , Great Britain declared as an exclusion marine zone to an area of 200 miles
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around the Malvinas and warned that from 12 all war vessels in this area would be sunk.
In order to prevent further conflict with the fleet and to allow the North American chan-
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cellor, General Alexander Haig, to get new ways of negotiations, on April 10 the argentine
attaché claimed at the North Atlantic Organization (NAO) that the Argentine Navy would not
accept the blockade.
With this decision, the transportation by sea to strengthen the islands would not be pos-
sible and the deployment would only be by plane.
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From twelve o’clock am, april 12 , the threat to sink any Argentine vessel in the area
started to be possible.

the argentine air force chaLLenge, strengthens and weakness
The possible operation theatre was air naval, therefore the armed systems, the Air Force
crew training, were not the ones required for the present characteristics. The target to defend
was an archipelago located at the limited boarder of action to which the combat planes were
based on the continent.
To set up an air defense system to guard such an objective, with a few possibilities of ac-
complishment, would require having a system of warning, air naval or embarked, in the flight
paths and having runways of at least, 2300 meters to operate with firefighter planes.
That was why, on April 2 , aluminum boards and way machinery were sent to extend the
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present runway in the islands.
All the necessary material was delayed due to inconvenient in the coordination to trans-
port it from Buenos Aires. By April 7 , the necessary equipment was shipped in the vessel
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Ciudad de Cordoba.
As during the navigation the blockade was declared, the vessel went to Puerto Deseado
instead of Malvinas. The personnel and light equipment were transported by plane C-130 to
Malvinas and the rest by trucks to Comodoro Rivadavia. This inconvenient impeded the plans
to enlarge the runway and it was not going to be used as emergency for the fire planes.
The islands were 400 nautical miles from continental airports which represented a serious
penalty especially for the attack performed by planes like Mirage.
As there was lack of refueling equipment in air, the planes would be able to fly only 2 or
3 minutes in the target zone. And the interceptors like M-III should reach Malavinas without
descending.
As regard the planes like A- 4B, C y Q with autonomy and equipment to reach, fire the
target and get back, almost always should refuel in air to hide their position flying short, low
distance to succeed in the operation.
Unfortunately this advantage was not enough due to the fact that there were only two KC-
130 refueling. Any inconvenient in the refueling meant that the pilot had to abort the mission
and come back to the base if not eject.
The case of the arm system: plane Super Etendard and the Exocet missile, from the Navy,
arriving form France, was just when the UN intimidated Argentina to retreat the troops,
therefore the equipment was embargoed. As a consequence, the 60% of it was delayed on